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Not so long ago, many tattoo studios were places that made you feel about as welcome as Michael Barrymore at a pool party, or Josef Fritzl popping along to the Ideal Home Show.

They were clinical and basic at best, and ferociously intimidating at worst; back-alley basement shacks where it seemed you wouldn’t be allowed in unless you were a member of a hardcore biker gang and willing to take away a party bag full of hepatitis with your wonky black (more like bottle green) ‘Love’ and ‘Hate’ knuckle ink.

The tattooists were anonymous (or notorious) local scratchers – you didn’t visit them because you’d seen their amazing work on telly or on p34 of Bizarre, but because they were the only artists whose shops you could get to on the number 34 bus.

But tattoo culture has changed drastically, and the ‘Tatt Pack’ of high-profile artists at the helm of the new luxury movement offer clients an inking experience glossier than a L’Oréal model’s barnet.

Visit one of their stunning ‘glarlours’ – a tattoo parlour with added glamour – and the only scratching you’re likely to encounter will come from the in-house DJ’s decks, while ‘Intimidation’ will be a perfume from the artist’s own range of upmarket products.

When they’ve finished colouring the incredible decoration adorning your back – a design they custom-created for you in their trademark style, but which you collaborated on through hours of conversation that they called ‘discourse’ – you’ll be tempted to get them to autograph it… for your tattooist is as well-known as the superstars they count as customers.

A host of factors have contributed to the emergence of these deluxe celebrity Tatt Packers. Websites such as Tattoo.TV, Bodymod.org and BMEZine.com, and specialist mags such as Skin Deep and Total Tattoo, mean that today’s discerning clients are wised-up about the wonders it’s possible to create with ink – so they’re much less prepared to naively accept it when “I-did-your-granddad’s-bicep” Bob from Small Town Studios tells them that the best tattoo they’re going to get is an anchor tapped in with a Capri-Sun drinking straw and a Bic biro.

Once you’ve sought out a needle-wielder you truly admire, it’s not so hard to hook up with them, either: tattoo conventions are popping up in the UK faster than a super-speed game of Whack-A-Mole (Norwich’s first tattoo convention happened last year) and established events such as Brighton Tattoo Convention are getting bigger and better.

It’s also increasingly common for decent studios to host visiting guest artists from around the globe. All this means that talented tattooists are becoming internationally renowned and in demand by those in the know. But members of the Tatt Pack are pushing things even further, to become snapped-by-the-paps superstars and household names. Here’s Bizarre’s guide to the four main reasons Tatt Packers are becoming celebs.

THEY’RE TOP OF THE SHOPS
Tatt Packers’ parlours are places you’ll want to linger in. American artist group The National Tattoo Association has already praised the shop of US inking icon Mario Barth (who’s inked big cheeses such as Sylvester Stallone and Pamela Anderson), Starlight Tattoo, as “the nicest tattoo studio worldwide”, and this winter Mario’s due to open King Ink in Las Vegas.

The 4,000sqft venue will have a baroque theme, with marble floors, chandeliers, lavish fabrics and glass skulls decorating the bar of a “high-tech interactive lounge-cum-nightclub, complete with an outdoor patio where guests can sip champagne”.

Also in the States is Hart & Huntington: a series of stores in Las Vegas, Orlando, and Honolulu set up by motocross rider and husband of pop singer Pink, Carey Hart. Their laser tattoo removal centre is headed up by Bizarre cover girl Sabina Kelly.

Meanwhile, London Ink legend Dan Gold has just broken out of the capital by launching his 13 INK studio in Liverpool. It’s one of several businesses, including a gallery, café and body mod shops, that he hopes to open “under the 13 INK banner”.

Strong branding, diversification and the concept of a chain of stores are key tenets of the Tatt Pack mantra. “The new parlour has a juicy orange colour scheme, and my logo – a club with the number 13 inside it – decorates the surfaces, the lights and the leather of my custom-made chairs,” Dan says.

“Spanning several floors, the shop looks like a mad professor’s lab in a James Bond movie, and includes a VIP room so my famous footballer and musician clients don’t get hassled by the public.

Non-celebs aren’t excluded from the fun and special treatment, though; I want 13 INK to be a social destination. There’s plenty of communal space for people to chill in, and an art area for my staff – Jo Talbot, Little Steve, Adam Griffiths and Mark The Shark – to draw and paint on everything from canvases to skateboards to shoes, in order to keep their creative juices flowing.”

Dan’s London Ink co-star Nikole Lowe recently launched her own Good Times Tattoo glarlour, decked out with antique wood furniture, boxes of mounted butterflies and taxidermy… and a bike rack, because far from being hog-revving Hells Angels, tattoo artists’ modern-day clients are just as likely to be eco-conscious pedal-pushers, businessmen or fashionistas.

As proved by the WAGs kitting out their nippers with Ed Hardy dummies emblazoned with flash designs, the Metal Morphosis piercing and tattoo counters in branches of posh department store Selfridges, and the models sent down the catwalk wearing temporary tatts by designer Chanel, tattoo culture and imagery appeal to a broader bunch of people than ever before. The Tatt Pack are capitalising on this by making their premises attractive to these new audiences.

“My Senses ‘tattoo couture’ studio has a classy spa-type feel, which makes it inviting to folk – particularly women – who want a tattoo but are put off by old-school ‘scary rocker’ parlours,” says New Yorker Friday Jones. “Getting ink there is a peaceful experience. Clients can relax amid the flowers and scented candles with a glass of wine, and have a massage or pedicure while I sketch designs with them. I also have an expert in-house airbrush artist for those who want to wear an image for a week or so before they commit for life, and I offer feminine, subtle white ink designs.”

The location of Tatt Pack glarlours also gives them a hyper-cool edge. Rather than being hidden out of sight down a dark alley, Friday’s studio is on well-to-do Fifth Avenue, while Mo Coppoletta’s vintage boutique-style shop, The Family Business, shares space with hip bars and restaurants in London’s Exmouth Market.

THEIR FAVOURITE DRINK IS CELEBRI-TEA
Tatt Packers’ studios may be plush, but they don’t sit on their tushes. Taking their cue from our Tatt Pack-leading cover star Kat Von D, they’re too busy shooting TV shows, courting cameras and putting the ‘I’ in ‘public eye’.

Savvy Dan Gold – whose chirpy Cockney demeanour and sharp-suited, trilby-topped, bespectacled dress sense is as much a part of his branding as his club-shaped logo – has been on TV since the early days of his career. BBC3 documentary Not Under My Roof showed him giving his ma a grand tour of his first shop in the Big Smoke’s King’s Cross, and now London Ink’s finished, he’s beginning a series called 13 INK (spot a pattern?), which’ll explore the history of tattooing as well as following Dan’s daily routine.

Dan reckons it takes a certain type of personality to become a media maestro: “You have to have a strong character to come across as interesting on the goggle box, and to provide the banter that customers want while they’re being tattooed.

Equally, though, you can’t be too fiery and stubborn, because making telly requires compromises. Even if you find a film crew you trust, you have to accept that shows are made for a broad, mostly mainstream, audience, so your persona will be edited to appeal to as many viewers as possible. Not every tattooist would feel comfortable with that.” Maybe that’s why Mario Barth’s founded his own production company: for ultimate control of his public image.

Henry Hate, originally from Los Angeles, now operates his Prick! studio in Shoreditch, London. He’s tattooed Amy Winehouse, Pete Doherty and the late Alexander McQueen, and he agrees with Dan that customers like their Tatt Pack artists charismatic, saying: “I’ve developed a circus-style character that’s become second nature for me when I’m in work. It’s what my clients expect and enjoy.”

His new wave act seems to parody the old-school Brit tattooing tradition of the snarling hard-ass needlesmith – perhaps given more bite because Henry’s gay. His website proclaims with faux arrogance that he’s a “loud, foul-mouthed, know-it-all brat”.

In contrast, Friday Jones has found she’s had to tone down her personality in order to surf the Tatt Pack TV trend. “My crew and I filmed a pilot last autumn, and are hoping our show will air this winter, but things got so wild on set that we had to replace the word ‘drama’ with ‘spice’ in our direction notes in an effort to calm things down a notch,” she laughs.

It’s interesting that Friday’s apparent fly-on-the-wall programme (produced by Shannon Fitzgerald, the woman involved with American ‘reality’ series Keeping Up With The Kardashians) is actually guided by carefully plotted scripting.

Bizarre can vouch for the fact that the lovely Ms Jones is a genuine person and a bona fide rocker, but just as Henry says, there’s a touch of contrived artifice in the way she and other Tatt Packers play up elements of their temperaments according to what the public lap up. And why not? If they didn’t, they’d still have a great tattoo business, but it wouldn’t be show business – that’s key difference between Tatt Packers and their more traditional peers.

If they have sufficient showbiz flair, artists can become true celebrities. Mario Barth, for example, has played the fame game so cleverly that in the USA he’s instantly recognisable in his own right. He’s heavyweight enough to appear in the same slot as Tommy Lee, Carey Hart and Steve-O in PETA’s ‘Ink Not Mink’anti-fur campaign posters, and at the 2006 Music Video Awards, Snoop Dogg and Korn queued to meet him.

THEY LAUNCH PRODUCTS AND STAR-STUDDED SIDE PROJECTS
Tattoos only scratch the surface of what the Tatt Pack do. They also have branded product lines, and branch out more than a sycamore on steroids to collaborate on celebrity side-projects, parties and charity events.

Launched about four years ago, Dan Gold’s Gold Ink range is now one of Europe’s best-selling liquid tattooing pigments, and there’s already a waiting list for the tattoo machines that will bear his 13 INK logo.

He’s currently guest DJing at a number of club nights, and is planning burlesque fundraisers to collect cash for soldier support group Help For Heroes. He tells Bizarre, “I’d like to fly to Afghanistan to tattoo some of the troops there and help improve morale.”

Mo Coppoletta has produced limited edition art prints with members of The Prodigy and has a book out this autumn, while Henry Hate has displayed his controversial fine art (breasts superimposed upon pre-teen girls, anyone?) alongside such names as Jason Atomic and Sexton Ming.

He’s also carved tattoo designs into a huge, colourfully lit block of ice with a Nissan Cube car frozen inside it. “Some people have accused me of selling out because I’ve helped promote a massive vehicle manufacturer,” he says, “but there was a balance between the commercial side of the stunt and the fact that it was a personal challenge. Nissan benefited from the exposure, and as well as gaining some advertising for myself, I got to use Japanese samurai chisels to tattoo ice! Everyone wins.”

THEY HAVE THEIR OWN RECOGNISABLE AND RESPECTED ARTISTIC TATTOOING STYLE
It only takes a blink to recognise Tatt Pack ink, because they’ve usually developed their own distinct style. Nikole Lowe is known for her expertly rendered Oriental imagery and strong use of rich yellow highlights, while Friday Jones’ subtle white tatts are a massive craze in NYC. Dan Gold’s famed for his graffiti-influenced designs, combining old-school ‘built to last’ colouring techniques that age well on the skin with quirky spray-can lettering and robot pictures.

“One of the most beautiful things about being high profile and doing TV shows is that clients are now more willing to trust me and give me the freedom to experiment,” says Dan. “I earned my stripes churning out Celtic bands and Chinese symbols in my early years, and now I’m famous enough that people trust me to do what I want. Obviously, we always have plenty of discourse about the design first, because they’re the one who’ll be wearing it the rest of their lives, but these days folk come to me specifically because they want a Dan Gold image.”

Trademark tatts can command a high price. Mario Barth sells a ,000 VIP card, encrusted with 1.5-carat diamonds and limited to 75 editions. Once activated, the card enables its owner to jump Mario’s two-year waiting list and fly by private jet to get custom-inked within 48 hours.

But Henry Hate says he didn’t establish his £120 minimum price solely to place an intrinsically high value on his ‘designer’ work; he reckons it also prompts his customers to value their own epidermis. “If you make tattoos too cheap, it makes it worryingly easy for people to get inked on a whim,” he says. “A higher price helps command the sensible solemnity that marking yourself forever deserves.”

After all, the Tatt Pack’s work may be very 2010, but everyone thinking of inking needs to consider the future – and whether in 2030 they’ll still love the brightly coloured android they had etched while sipping a smoothie on a leopard-print couch, joking with the edgy artist they’d seen on MTV…

Future ink, INC
In 20 years’ time, however, the trail being blazed by the Tatt Pack could still be burning strong. Glarlours might be as ubiquitous as Starbucks, and chains could be franchised out. There are definitely those who’d much rather get their epidermis etched in luxurious surroundings, and some people may appreciate the dependable predictability that comes with visiting a chain.

Just as the service and décor tend to be standardised in all Toni & Guy hair salons, and the taste of your margherita can be relied upon to be pretty much the same at any branch of Pizza Express, it could be reassuring to know that if you go to a ‘Brand X’ glarlour, you’re going walk away with a tattoo that’s of the standard and style you expected, with no nasty surprises to worry about.

But for others, perching their posterior on a designer recliner ringed by fresh flowers or crystal objets d’art could feel uncomfortable, or seen as somehow ‘wussy’. Many folk feel more at home in the rough’n’ready environment of a traditional studio, and for some, the thrill of that old-school scratcher-style vibe is part of their body mod adventure.

Here at Bizarre, we think the more options there are, the better. But then we’d never complain about a little champagne while contemplating tattoo pain…

Have you had a tatt from a celeb inker? Or tested out  a glarlour? Have your say at Bizarremag.com/Yourbizarre